1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a portable infant seat, which is attachable to the back of a standard chair.
2. Description of the Prior Art
There are many portable infant seats. Some are freestanding; others are intended to be attached to other objects, such as chairs or tables. Freestanding ones, especially high-chairs in which children sit while eating, are difficult to transport. As a result, there have been many smaller chairs, which are more portable. These chairs attach to tables or adult chairs so that they can be positioned at a dining table in a restaurant or in another's home.
Fornetti, U.S. Pat. No. 3,059,965 (1962) discloses a chair for an infant that is designed to attach and be removed from the edge of a table. There are currently available several variations on the system described in Fornetti. Especially as an infant grows and gains weight, the infant/chair combination may shift the center of gravity beyond the base of the table. The table may then fall over causing the child to fall to the floor with the table following onto the child. The stability of the table might changed while the child is attached to the table if, for example, a heavy object is removed from the opposite end of the table from the child after the child seat is attached to the table. Another potential problem occurs if the infant seat loosens from the table. Also, the child is carried at table height above the floor and falls a significant distance if the seat looses its attachment to the table.
Many infant seats are designed to rest on a horizontal surface such as a floor. Such seats have been used with dining table chairs, but the infant seats do not position the child properly with respect to the table; it is usually too low for the child to eat comfortably. In other intances, the design of the chair will not allow the infant to be close to the table.
There have been infant seats that were designed to attach to the back of a chair. At one time, before modern child safety seats became popular, it was not uncommon to seat an infant in an automobile infant seat that hooked over the automobile seat back.
Seats in automobiles share some standard characteristics that make it easier to attach infants to them. The seat back is continuous and relatively thick. The thickness usually varies within a relatively limited range. Chairs in one's home vary considerably, however. Some chairs may have a very thin back, which may have vertical slats. Other may be very plush. The seat backs of some chairs are relatively planar; others are curved. It is somewhat difficult to secure a single seat to a wide variety of seat backs.